Ben Thomas and three colleagues were driving north out of Baghdad in an SUV on a clear mid-September morning, headed down a dirt road into a rural village, when gunmen in several surrounding buildings opened fire on them.

In a brief but intense firefight, Thomas hit one of the attackers with a single shot from his M4 carbine at a distance he estimates was 100 to 110 yards.

I think this ammo was featured on a recent edition of "Modern Marvels" on the History Channel, where the topic was (to my delight), "Bullets". This guy was doing a demo on these uncooked fifteen-pound hams with a rifle round -- I think it was .308.

First, IIRC, he fired a standard bullet (dunno if it was FMJ, HP or what) into the first ham from about 10 yards, and it made the standard small entry hole and larger exit hole. Then he shot the second with one of these new rounds, and blew it to shreds.

I remember my initial reaction being, "Holy sh*t!!".

25
posted on 12/03/2003 4:33:00 AM PST
by Joe Brower
("If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face, forever." - G. Orwell)

SLA Marshall wrote a report for the Army on infantrymen in Europe. Logistics supplied something in the range of a quarter of a million rounds for each enemy killed. Mind you this was in the semi-auto Springfield days. I would imagine round usage per kill has only gone up. Anyways, the more tailored your round is, the smaller the range of effectiveness is. For example, a Formula 1 car would move you around the land battlefield the quikest, but the majority of the terrain would be out of the question, hence military vehicles are more truck(ish).

As to the wog popped in the butt at short range. Well the bullet would of still been going quite fast, he might of had a full bladder/full lower intestins, hence a lot and dense water thus a great hydro shock effect.

It could of happened with just a regular ball ammo. OR maybe it was the round. Anyways, correlation is not causation.

As to the gel/temp dispute. I suspect that at warmer tempratures the gel would be too soft and not match the averaged behaviour of human muscle/organs. The temp shouldn't effect the behavior of the bullet as the contact time is so small.

2 cents worth.

29
posted on 12/03/2003 4:57:50 AM PST
by Leisler
(Dean, He's Not Crazy, He Just Looks That Way)

>>As to the gel/temp dispute. I suspect that at warmer tempratures the gel would be too soft and not match the averaged behaviour of human muscle/organs. The temp shouldn't effect the behavior of the bullet as the contact time is so small.

There is no magic bullet out there. Unless they contain explosives or poison their potential wounding effects will be governed by their kinetic energy, frontal area and bullet design. Bullets designed to fragment, expand, tumble or penetrate are nothing new. They have all been around for decades.

Every couple of years you hear about some new "super bullet". Some, like the Black Talons, are actually pretty good, but none are ever revolutionary. We've basically known how bullets work for about 100 years now and there's not much you can do to them that hasn't already been done.

OK, let me make a prediction here. Remember the "Rhino Ammo" hoax a few years back, when an article came out about some fictional new bullet that was even nastier than the much ballyhooed Black Talon round?

Within a few weeks, we will see the Brady Bunch pick up on this and the fact that it's sold to civilians. This will be something else to stir up anti-gun hysteria, create something else to ban, as well as provide another reason to demonize gun shows.

The truth is that we are attempting to get a quart out of a pint pot. No amount of tinkering with the bullet will improve the 5.56mm. The effectiveness of the .308-7.62mm is without question, which is why it remains the calibre of the machine gun and the sniper rifle. It is going to take a gutsy call by someone in the Pentagon to finally end this boondogle.

The purpose of Sierra MatchKings are for long range competition. Sierra doesn't even recommend them for hunting.

The design of the MatchKing is a lead cylinder inside a copper jacket that is made as long as possible by weight and the ability of most of them to fit inside the magazine. By keeping the nose of the bullet hollow, they kept the weight down and still offered an extremely long bullet for bearing surface against the rifling. As far as the bullets being hollow points, it isn't even noticeable.

The .223 80 grain cartridges don't even fit inside the magazine. They're designed for the last relay in High Power competition where the cartridge has to be single loaded.

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